The Saxophone Diaries
by Emila Jones
Summary: This is in the process of being written, but it's a high school story about band geeks :-) It's not marching band, but close enough. The chapters are short because they switch perspectives of different people. I'm trying to add a chapter every other day.
1. Niemi 1

The alarm clock went off. I groaned, rolled over, and fell on the floor. My mom banged on the door. "You okay in there, honey? Did your dresser fall over again?"  
  
"No mom. The gremlins are just raiding my closet again," I yelled back.  
  
"I don't see how they can get the doors open with all the junk you have in there," She replied, no doubt rolling her eyes.  
  
I managed to get to the light switch without breaking anything (body parts or otherwise) and flipped it on. My room is a dark green (not that you can really tell), but the walls are covered with everything imaginable. I put old sheet music up in one corner like wallpaper. Over my bed there are dozens of old calendar pictures, ranging from castles to penguins to movie stars. I love movies. Above my closet I have dozens of postcards from just about everywhere you can think of. The rest of my wall space is covered in posters. They range from Star Wars and Indiana Jones to car posters and posters of favorite musicians. I love Maynard Ferguson. I saw perform about three years ago, and fell in love with his type of music.  
  
The light hurt my eyes. It was too bright. A car honked outside, and I groaned again. My ride to school (Kat) was here. I opened the window, and she yelled at me. "Niemi," (that's my last name) "You're gonna make us late!!!" I waved my hand in a 'pssshhh' gesture at her and replied, "Love you too, darling!" which made her laugh.  
  
I closed the window and pulled on a pair of jeans that didn't smell too bad, and a tie-dye shirt that didn't have any stains on it. Grabbing my bag and sax case, I ran down the stairs, through the kitchen, and grabbed a pop tart. My mother yelled something about eating a good breakfast for the first day of school, but I ignored her. I ran out the front door, and threw my bad and case in the trunk of Kat's car. I climbed in the passenger seat, and we were off. Pulling out of the driveway, Kat clicked her stopwatch and said, "Wow, a new record. Three minutes, thirty- three seconds. Maybe we should call the Guinness Book of World Records; quickest time for getting ready for school." I laughed and turned on the radio. Loud. Come Together started blasting from the speakers. A good omen for the first day of the last year of High School. 


	2. Will 1

The office was like any other high school office I'd been in. The secretary was typing away at her computer; the principal's office was closed. Random artwork created by students who had graduated twenty years ago hung on the paint-chipped walls. I sat on the hard wooden bench that held the initials of countless graffiti artists, names that were, and no doubt in their own time very notorious. I doubted that anybody knew who any of them were anymore. The secretary printed off a schedule for me, and I got up to get it from her, asking, "Can you tell me where the band room is? I need to drop off my alto and talk to the director real quick."  
  
She looked up from the computer and walked to the door without saying a word. She grabbed a random kid from out in the hall and pulled him in. I looked him down, and realized that this had to be the BMOC. He looked to be six feet two inches, and by the size of his shoulders, I knew that he was the starting quarterback since freshman year, and nobody messed with this guy. I swallowed and asked if he could show me the band room. He sized me up, and stuck out his hand, saying "Brandon Young". I put mine hand in his (which completely covered mine) and replied, "Will Mitchell." He nodded, and did a "follow me" gesture with his head. I picked up my case, slung my bag over my shoulder and followed his advice. 


	3. Niemi 2

We pulled up to school exactly five minutes before the first class. Kat pulled up to the curb and let me off. I got my stuff from the trunk, and ran to the band room. There was a new director this year, and I wanted to meet her before class. I had American Women's History first period, and the history teacher and I were friends.  
  
The band director wasn't there when I got to the room, so I decided to wait. Nothing like missing first period on the first day of school. While I was waiting, I hit the practice room and started going crazy on sax. I started with long tones, then moved to scales. I set my metronome to 180 and played all fifteen perfectly. I pulled out some jazz chords and started doing a crazy improv in "A flat". It felt good to just go crazy. I had heard we were getting another senior who played sax. This would be cool, even if he wasn't all that great. I was the only alto up until this point, and I was really looking foreword to another one in jazz band. Suddenly, I was aware that there were people outside the room. Good, an audience. Let them stare. I'm the best, let them hear this. I laughed. I hoped this new sax player would be good, I didn't want to get egotistical. 


	4. Will 2

Brandon led me to the band room without beating me up, which I took as a good omen for the rest of the year. If I got on the "good side" of this guy, maybe he'd keep others from tormenting me. We got to the hall the band room was on, and I heard this awesome saxophone-recording going and smiled. Whoever the band director was, he'd be cool if he listened to music like this. I wondered who it was, because I didn't recognize the style.  
  
I glanced at the wall and rolled my eyes. Some girl was running for Student Council President. Girls can't do anything right. Take my dysfunctional sister for example. She was elected president of the student council at our old school and did nothing. She lost the check for the Senior Prom and took the money away from me. My real mother is a drunk who killed herself off with booze. I live with my uncle, and have for the past seven years. In my opinion, girls were good for one thing: having children. I know I'm horribly sexist, but I've never met a worthwhile girl.  
  
We stopped outside of the room where the CD was playing. Justin asked, "What instrument is that? Saxophone, right?" I said, "Yeah. It's a great recording. I wonder who made it."  
  
Brandon gave me a look. "That's no recording. Goes by Niemi, last name, dunno why. Made states since freshman year. That's the best we've got."  
  
I was amazed. I could play like that, but another guy in the same school? Unconceivable. It was awesome. It was more than awesome. This was great. I knocked on the door and opened in it.  
  
My first view of Niemi was a tie-die shirt. He had his back to the door. He was a sort of short guy, with somewhat broad shoulders. He had long, girlish brown, curly hair that hung down to his shoulders. He stopped when I entered and turned around. That's when I realized that Niemi was a girl. 


	5. Niemi 3

The door opened. I didn't realize it until I heard it hit the wall. Then I jumped and turned around.  
  
The boy standing there was about a head taller than me (which isn't that hard, since most of my friends are taller than me) with crazy red hair and wearing a black shirt. Summer in this town gets over 100 degrees before ten, and we used to have contests to see who could fry the egg the fastest on the sidewalk back in grade school. He wasn't that bad looking, I thought. The best thing about him, however, was that he was carrying a saxophone case.  
  
"Hey!" I said, excited that we were getting a new sax player.  
  
"Uh… hey. I didn't realize that there was someone in here… I thought it was a recording," he muttered, looking down at his black and white shoes.  
  
I laughed and blushed. Checking my watch I asked, "You want to play? We're getting a new band director, and she's not here right now. It's just the first day of school, and nobody is going to care if we're late."  
  
"Heh. I'm Will Mitchell, by the way. You are…?"  
  
"Niemi. Amelia Niemi. I go by my last name though."  
  
"That's cool. I'm gonna put my sax away… Where do we put our instruments? Then I'm gonna go to class. I'm new here, and I don't know anybody, so I just don't want to be late."  
  
I nodded. "Cool. You can leave your sax in here, since this is our room for sectionals. There's you and me, a junior who plays barri, and two freshman tenors. You in Jazz Band?"  
  
"Yeah," he answered, while putting his case down in the corner. I noticed Brandon Young, my boyfriend in ninth grade, standing out in the hall, and exclaimed, "Brandon!! What's up?"  
  
He grinned, and shrugged his shoulders. I've known Brandon forever, but after he started playing football, I didn't get to hang out with him that often. He asked, "You doing anything this weekend? First game of the season, you want to come?"  
  
"Sure." Our school doesn't have a marching band because we've never had a band director last that long. Probably because the administration hates the art program. They want to focus on the sports teams, like most schools. They practically ran off the last band director with pitchforks when he asked for a raise. The football team, of course, got new jerseys and helmets every year.  
  
I got to first period exactly twenty minutes late. The teacher, Mrs. Tran, just rolled her eyes and told me to take a seat. She started with a short lecture about how women's rights have not been equal, and still weren't today. A boy in the front row raised his hand and asked, "Doesn't the nineteenth amendment fix that?" Mrs. Tran asked if anybody wanted to answer that.  
  
I raised my hand and answered, "No. The nineteenth amendment says that everyone who is a citizen of the US can vote, and Congress has the right to enforce it. Women do not make as much money as men do for doing the same job. Where are the women presidents? Where are the women musicians? Where are the women generals? Where are the women movie directors? Where are we shown strong women in movies? Standing next to strong men. What about strong women who don't have men? They're called lesbians." I heard a guy in the second row whisper something about "lesbian" to his neighbor and snicker. I didn't care. I've been a feminist as long as I can remember, and I still take pleasure in doing something better than "the boys", which is why being very good at music is so important to me, since it's a male- dominated activity.  
  
Mrs. Tran laughed at my answer, even though she knew that I was serious. She's been my teacher since freshman year, and she has encouraged most of my feminist state-of-mind.  
  
I leaned back in my seat to listen to the debate unfolding. I had said my thoughts, and was feeling cocky because I knew that nobody could prove my arguments wrong. I was feeling cocky because it was the first day of school, and so far it looked to be a great and easy year. How wrong I was. How wrong. 


	6. Brandon 1

I walked Amelia (I refuse to call her Niemi, no matter how much she insists. Amelia is such a pretty name. When we were dating three years ago, I would joke around with her, saying that we should name our first child after her) to her first period class, then went to mine, which was gym. Our school required us to take a quarter of gym every year, no matter if we were on a sports team or not, which I thought was a good policy, except they put all the jocks in first period gym, which basically made it another football practice during the day. I shouldn't complain, I was on the team.  
  
Sophomore year I had tried out because I didn't have any time commitments after school, and I was worried about extra curricular activities. I saw Amelia with her music, and other friends in student government or drama, and here I was, going to all the performances and debates, but nothing of my own for people to see me perform. I could throw and catch fairly decently, and I was big, even then.  
  
So I made the football team, and sometimes people came to games, and I didn't get to go to all the shows, but that was okay. Until people started treating me like a jock. I would sit with the jocks at lunch, and grew away from my other friends. I didn't even notice it, until Amelia broke up with me one weekend. I sort of minded, but there were cheerleaders to go out with, and parties and games and victories. I became a jock for a year, until that rainy day at the beginning of junior year… I shook my head. This wasn't a time to reminisce about the past. The future had problems all of its own.  
  
For one thing, this new boy, Will, was sexist. I saw the way he looked at Kat's poster for student government, a mixture of disbelief and superiority over her. I saw the way he looked when he realized Amelia was a girl. He had the same look as my dad did, when he argued with my mother. My parents have been divorced since I was in the fifth grade, but I never forgot the hate in my father's eyes. I live with my mom, who is totally awesome. She's a single working mother, with two little brothers in eighth and ninth grades, and me. After seeing the lengths she went to, working double overtime every night to make sure that we could buy new clothes every fall and presents at Christmas, there is no way I could ever not thing a woman was capable of everything a man was.  
  
"Class" started, and we ran drills for the length of the period, getting ready for the game on Friday. I was glad Amelia and I were talking again. I was just worried that Will was going to make life rough for her. She'd had enough trouble from people, mainly because she wasn't as tough as she liked to pretend she was. Amelia would practically murder me if she found this out, but she didn't as of yet. I had a talent for reading people's expressions and words. Maybe I would be a good psychologist. It seemed like a good occupation. Paid well, at least.  
  
Practice ended, and I took a shower. The cool water felt good, washing all the sweat from class off. I dressed fast and ran off to find Will before he found Amelia. I didn't have to look for long. He was putting a textbook in the locker next to mine.  
  
"Will," I said, trying to be as serious as I could. "We have to talk." 


	7. Kat 1

First period I had English with the most boring English teacher in the school. I doodled pictures of cars all over my notebook. I didn't see the point in taking an English class senior year. If I was going to become a professional artist, shouldn't I be taking all the art classes I could?  
  
I sighed and settled in for a boring year. I figured I could get another half hour of sleep in the mornings, but that would be the only worthwhile part of the class. I wished I had gotten into Niemi's history class first period. Mrs. Tran always taught interesting classes. I was about to take my first nap of the year when I noticed the new kid. He had bright red hair and was kind of cute. I wondered if he would be in any of my other classes. He sort of looked like the artsy type.  
  
I'm really not the kind of girl who's totally preppy and into guys and all that, but boring English classes bring out the worst in you.  
  
I'm really into politics, and I have a lot of ways to make this school year a lot better than past years. I was hoping to have some more fundraisers for dances and prom, and better decorations. Last year's were horrible. Also, I wanted to have more school assemblies so performance art student would have more of a chance to shine, and might get more attention from the administration. Niemi and I never talked about it, but I knew she wished we could have had a marching band, and better "band" conditions. What's the point of having a sax player who was the best in the state if nobody in your school cared?  
  
That wasn't entirely true. All our friends thought it was the most absolutely amazing thing on the planet to actually know somebody who was that damned good. We had a tight group of friends that went in rings that drifted further outward. Niemi and I had been best friends forever, and Brandon was sometimes there. Not always last year, but after the accident, he had been around more. There were always random band geeks hanging around, some of them real friends of ours, and some were kids (usually freshies) who thought that talent would rub off on them.  
  
The boy with the red hair was looking at me. I flashed him a smile. Maybe English wouldn't be that bad after all. 


	8. Will 3

I had no idea what to expect of first period. The class was English and it was boring. I didn't know any of the kids (big surprise there, since I had only met two students and the lady in the office, but I didn't think she really counted) so there was nobody to play paper football with, which was really juvenile, but it killed time, which was the important part. I noticed a good-looking girl sitting across the room and staring at me. I decided to stare back. That seemed the best way to deal with situations like this. She blushed, obviously thinking I was into her. I mentally shrugged. Why not? A little flirting never hurt anyone.  
  
After class was over, I found my locker and opened it. There was a can of old salsa and an empty diet coke bottle. I closed my locker. Why disturb these ancient relics that had been left to rot?  
  
Brandon tapped my shoulder. I nodded, and was about to go to my next class (which just happened to be band), but Brandon said, "We need to talk," so I nodded and wondered what could have gone wrong in just one class period.  
  
Brandon checked the hall behind me, and then behind him, then asked, "What do you think of Am… of Niemi?"  
  
"She's a girl."  
  
"Yes, but what else?"  
  
"I'm better than her."  
  
"Dude, you've got to understand this. Niemi is a total feminist, and if she finds out that you're sexist, there will be no living with her. She's been known to… attack people before for their opinions. She's a great friend, but a great enemy too."  
  
I sighed. First, I was going to have to accept the fact that a girl was as good as I was on saxophone. Second, She's a feminist girl. "I'll be careful, I guess. Should I just, ignore her, or what?"  
  
Brandon shook his head. "There is no way you can possibly ignore her. Niemi doesn't like to be ignored and she doesn't like to be laughed at or insulted. Constructive criticism. Don't eat lunch with her; don't sit next to her in classes if you can. In band, don't hang out with the same people she does and don't show her up. If you can help her, then go ahead. Accept her help, she's not too pushy, and it's always good advice. Just don't let her know your… opinions."  
  
"Great. Why don't I just sell my soul to the devil as well? Thanks, but I think I can handle this myself." I turned and walked away. I had played the "loner" before; I could do it again.  
  
Brandon grabbed my shoulder. "Dude," he said. "At the end of last year, Niemi was driving her boyfriend home from a band concert, and they were hit by another car. She obviously survived, but she limps – you can't really tell it, but she can't run at all. It's a sort of hobble-step. Hurts her even worse than it should; People laugh at her. She had to put up with a lot of crap over the summer about her leg – it looks really bad still. Hey boyfriend went into a coma and didn't survive the week. She basically shut herself away and practiced all summer. The last day of school, she couldn't do what you heard this morning. Niemi is going to see you as a sort of… ally, because you play sax. You can't insult her, can't criticize her. She's not as strong as she likes to pretend she is. And she'll murder me if she finds out that I told you this. Be good to her."  
  
I pulled away again and walked to the band room, thinking about all this. The accident was probably her fault, and if she couldn't deal with it, then there had to be something wrong with her. Niemi was a challenge to be beat. That was all. If she couldn't deal, then she shouldn't play.  
  
I squared my shoulders and laughed. A challenge was something I hadn't had in quite a while. 


	9. Band Director 1

I was late to my first class of the day, which was second period. I taught three classes: two were band, and one was a music theory class. Second period was symphonic band. I had gotten details about all of the kids over the summer, and I was surprised to see that I had two awesome alto saxophones – one had been here, and she had made states every year she had tried for it. Another one had moved from Maryland, where he held the same status. I was going to start Jazz Band the second week of school, and have it be for an hour before first period.  
  
I could pick the girl out first, because she had the largest crowd of freshmen around her. I didn't know why, but freshmen always seemed to think that talent could rub off onto them. She didn't seem to mind, though. She laughed and joked over the freshmen to her friends. Another thing I noticed was that there were very few girls in the class. This saxophone was the only senior, I knew, but I had expected more than the ten girls or so.  
  
I found the other saxophone sitting in a corner, wearing all black. He was the only one not talking to anybody, and he was watching the crowd with great interest.  
  
I decided that enough time had been wasted so I got up to the stand and yelled for everyone to be quiet. I had a moment of silence, and everyone started talking again. I sighed, and hoped the rest of the year wouldn't end up being like this. I was about to yell again, when the girl saxophone stood up and yelled for me. The room went silent and stayed silent.  
  
"Thank you," I told her, much appreciative that somebody had some prestige in here. The band room was the most uncivilized of places. The girl nodded and sat down, smacking somebody lightly when they made a good- natured comment.  
  
"I'm your worst nightmare. Who brought their instruments?" I introduced myself and asked. About half the band raised their hands, and everyone else looked embarrassed. "Everyone have your instruments tomorrow. Go get them if you have them, and be ready to play in five minutes."  
  
I had the kids play some scales and simple exercises, and I decided that they weren't that bad. I let all the kids go early, except for the two saxes. I wanted to hear what they could do.  
  
The girl was Amelia Niemi, and she played first. I was amazed at her obvious talent for the instrument. She didn't seem to have trouble with anything, and there was very little she could improve on.  
  
The boy was Will Mitchell. He scoffed a little bit at Amelia's playing, but I didn't think anything of it. He started by playing scales – at an amazingly fast pace. Then, he did a sort of jazz improv with the scales, going completely wild. I had to stop him, because I wasn't going to have time to talk if he played any longer.  
  
"You guys are obviously very talented. I think it's absolutely amazing that we have two state-worthy altos in the same school. Since you guys are both seniors, I'm going to have you be co-section leaders. If one of you were older, I'd choose that one, but I'm not going to chose. I'd like to work with you on some solos and stuff, so talk to me about it. Go to class, you'll be late!" I suddenly realized that it was three minutes into third period. "I'll write you notes, where are you going?"  
  
"Calculus," Amelia said.  
  
"Calculus," Will said.  
  
"Good. One note. Tell your teacher I'm sorry." I shooed them out of the band room and smiled. This would be a good year. 


End file.
